This is a database of
information about worship books printed before 1601. This
project was developed at the University of Michigan in
Ann Arbor, Michigan, and The National Endowment for the
Humanities funded early years of the work. It is now
supported by the University of Michigan, the supervising
personnel being:

Dr. David Crawford, Director(Professor Emeritus of Musicology, University of
Michigan, Ann Arbor)
Dr. James Borders, Associate
Director(Professor of Musicology, University of
Michigan, Ann Arbor)Dr. Barbara Haggh-Huglo, Associate
Director(Professor of Music, University of
Maryland, College Park)Dr. David Rutherford, Advisor(Assistant Professor of History, Central
Michigan University, Mount
Pleasant)

We are interested in global
questions about worship in Renaissance Europe. Our
definition of liturgy, often a topic for spirited
discussion, is rather loose; when in doubt about a
particular book, we include it. We wish to portray here
the European books of ritual for the several Catholic
churches and also books for Protestant and Jewish faiths
during the tumultuous generations before 1601. Our goal
is to help colleagues find the books that can strengthen
their research.

RELICS now includes information on over 13,992 titles.
This information is based upon personal inspections of
books in most of the major research libraries of the
United States and also libraries in a few selected
European cities. Some additional information derives from
published bibliographies and library catalogs. Since this
is an atypically ecumenical and international enterprise,
much remains to be done; we will gratefully acknowledge
in the database corrections or additions that you bring
to our attention.

This database has been hosted by the University of
Michigan University Library since July 1995 and since February
2007 is being further developed by the Scholarly
Publishing Office. The data are periodically exported
from another offline database maintained by the project's
supervising personnel. Although information at the
worksite is regularly updated, the file that is publicly
available is less frequently updated.

Searching
capabilities for this database include the
following:

By year and date of
printing

By printer's
name

By printer's
city

By publisher's
name

By publisher's
city

By book type (Missal,
Processional, etc.)

By users (Roman,
Franciscan, Ambrosian, etc.)

By names of artists,
authors, editors, or translators

By country of
probable use

By modern locations
of copies

By the presence or
absence of illustrations, music, or red ink

By language of
texts

Until the online
interface is improved, certain types of searches are
difficult to perform. If you have difficulty performing
the kind of search you desire, please contact Dr. James
Borders for help since he may be able to perform the
query more effectively in the offline version.